Environment and Ecology Mixed Practice — MCQs with Answers (Set 22)

Maharashtra declared the Blue Mormon as its state butterfly in 2015, becoming the first Indian state to do so.

The Gangetic (Ganges River) Dolphin was declared India’s National Aquatic Animal in 2009, to channel attention and resources toward its conservation.

The dugong is a herbivorous marine animal and is protected under Schedule I of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972. But it is not found along the entire Indian coast, its range is fragmented.

Schedule I gives the highest, absolute level of protection under the Act. The tiger is the classic Schedule I example, so any Schedule I species gets that same protection tier — it doesn’t imply near-extinction or endemism.

All three (gharial, Indian wild ass, wild buffalo) are Schedule I species under the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972, and cannot be hunted except under narrow legal exceptions.

The UNCCD secretariat sits in Bonn, Germany. COP1 in Rome in 1997 chose Bonn as the seat. An interim secretariat worked in Geneva until the move to Bonn in 1999.

Statements 1 and 3 are correct. Statement 2 is false: UNCCD’s priority region is Africa broadly, not specifically South Asia and North Africa.

TEEB began at the G8+5 Environment Ministers’ meeting in Potsdam, Germany, in March 2007, as part of a call for a global study on the economics of biodiversity loss.

TEEB is hosted by UNEP alone, not jointly by UNEP/IMF/WEF, so statement 1 is false. Statements 2 and 3 both match TEEB’s actual mandate.

BirdLife International’s global partnership has identified and documented more than 13,000 Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas worldwide.

Norman Myers first proposed the biodiversity hotspots concept in 1988, developed with Conservation International. This is a common exam trap since BirdLife is also a major conservation partnership.

Statements 1 and 3 are correct: BirdLife is a Global Partnership of Conservation Organizations that identifies Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas. Statement 2 is false.

Statements 1 and 3 are correct: FCPF is a global partnership assisting countries’ REDD+ efforts. Statement 2 is false — it does not fund individual scientific research.

The BioCarbon Fund Initiative for Sustainable Forest Landscapes is a multilateral fund managed by the World Bank.

The answer is that Article 6.8 allows cooperation without trading credits. It is a non-market approach. Articles 6.2 and 6.4 trade units. There is no global carbon price floor in Article 6. Article 6.8 is not limited to developed countries. It did not replace Joint Implementation. Memory hook: 6.8 shares, it does not sell.

The answer is COP26, Glasgow, 2021. Negotiators agreed the final Article 6 rules there on 13 November 2021, after six years of talks. The rules guard against double counting. COP29 in Baku later endorsed the Article 6.4 standards. COP21 and COP24 came before the deal. Memory hook: Glasgow agreed the deal, Baku endorsed the standards.

The answer is the corresponding adjustment. The seller adds the transferred tonnes to its own emissions balance. The buyer subtracts them. So only one country counts the cut. Reductions that are claimed for other uses are tracked separately as entitlement to claim. A border adjustment taxes imports. A cap limits total emissions. A baseline is a starting level. None of these stops double counting.

The answer is the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). The CDM was the Kyoto Protocol’s carbon-credit scheme. COP30 agreed to close it, and PACM takes over. Joint Implementation, the Adaptation Fund and the Green Climate Fund are different bodies. Memory hook: PACM is the CDM’s successor.

The answer is Article 6.2. It lets two countries trade emission cuts directly, as ITMOs. Article 6.4 is the central UN mechanism. Article 6.8 trades nothing. Article 6.1 is a general opening clause, not a trading track. Memory hook: 6.2 pairs two countries.

Some Shark Bay dolphins carry a sea sponge over their rostrum like a glove, protecting it while foraging along abrasive, sandy seafloors, a skill passed down through generations.

New Caledonian Crows bend twigs into hook shapes to extract grubs from crevices, among the most sophisticated tool-making behaviours documented in any bird species.

Sea otters dive for a flat stone, then rest it on their chest while floating and use it as an anvil to crack open shellfish like mussels and clams.

Chimpanzees strip leaves from twigs and lower them into termite mounds, eating the termites that climb onto the twig — a classic example of tool use in primates.

Orangutans strip leaves from a branch and use the resulting stick to scrape insects out of tree holes and logs, a well-documented tool-making behaviour.

Ratufa indica, the Indian giant squirrel, is a much larger, brightly multi-coloured, primarily arboreal species endemic to India’s forests, distinct from the small, common palm squirrels seen in gardens and cities.